Why Oh Why Do My Plumbing Pipes 'vibrate'??????

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Verdeboy

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Humming Pipes: The majority of the time, humming in the pipes is due to a toilet fill valve that is either leaking slightly or working constantly because of a flapper leak or some other slow leak from the tank.

Solution: Replace the fill valve and/or flapper. If necessary, replace the tank-to-bowl bolts and the tank-to-bowl gasket.

Water hammer: is a loud banging or clanging of the pipes usually occurring when a valve is turned on or off. This is usually due to loose pipes that are either banging together or banging against the wall.

Solution: Anchor the offending pipes to the wall. Buy water hammer arrestors. Lower the water pressure with a pressure reducing valve (PRV).
 
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Leon The Plumber

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why do my water pipes hum, viberate, or bang

As far as the banging, I can help you there.
If the home or building is plumbed properly,there should be vaccume chambers behind all the lavatories. Some times they will get filled with water, so every time you flush a toilet or shut off a valve the pipes will thump or bang.
To correct this you must shut off the main,then take the bonnets off all the stops hot and cold at each lav,holding a small bucket or pan under each. When all chambers have been drained replace the bonnets turn the water on and all should be as normal.

P.S. The bonnett is the nut behind the shut off handle on your lav. stops.
Shut the stop off loosen the nut, when it's loose then turn the handle counter clock wise until the whole stem comes out. To replace just do in reverse.


Thanks Leon The Plumber
 

Jadnashua

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Simple air chambers are basically a waste of materials. They have been supplanted by a properly working engineered arrestor which has the air separated from the water. By keeping the air separate, they can continue to work for a very long time. On a well used system, an air chamber can saturate very quickly and then become useless. It also can trap stagnet water since there is no flow through it.
 

moozoo

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Here's my answer!

Every fall when it's time to check my boiler. I make sure that there's enough water to keep up the proper pressures as per the gauge. After not finding answers to my humming plumbing problem I decided to let a little water out of the system. I purged about a half a gallon or so........... and it worked! No more humm! Evidently my tank pressure was just a little high. Maybe this will work for you too! Good luck!
 

Thatguy

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So, first choice for troubleshooting pipe humming is check your water meter for small flows: 0.3 GPM or less?
 
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Just Joan

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What is wrong if the pipes hammer when you turn the water on?

I've had the pipes making a hammering noise when turning on the water for a couple of weeks now. Today the water flow is barely a trickle. What's the problem? (p.s. Waited about an hour, water flow back to normal, but still some banging when faucet is turned on.)

Thanks.
 
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Jadnashua

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Does it happen when you open ANY valve, or only select ones? Make sure that the main shutoff is open all the way, along with those for the toilets and sinks. Shutoffs (stop valves) are basically designed for full on or full off, not as a throttling valve. Any valve that has a washer rather than a ball valve, can vibrate when water flows by. Often, on those, you can replace the washer and solve a noise problem.
 

Austin Uhri

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Every time I have a customer with this problem. They claim the water isn't even running, or it happens all during the night. It ends up being a flapper in one of the toilets. The flapper develops some calcium deposits or some other very small obstruction which doesen't allow it to fully close. This allows a very small amount of water to get buy the flapper and this chuckling water creates a vibration resonating throughout the house pipes which might be very difficult to deterine where the humming is even coming from.
 
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